still another world out there. But the overgrown backyard didn’t convince me. In my pocket I found the very last of my cocaine. I used a butter knife to scrape out what was left, snorted it, and then licked my finger and ran it through the bag and then over my teeth. I stood for a minute letting my chemicals acclimate themselves, and then went back to work.
I went back to the living room. The body had been found here. Someone had tossed a carpet over the bloodstain on the wood floor. I pushed it aside.
I sat in a chair and looked at Paul’s blood.
No, I corrected myself. The victim’s blood. Paul was gone. There was no Paul and maybe never had been. Only the victim,
a
victim, the role he was apparently born to fill. All his life he probably thought he was something else, something so much more interesting: friend, husband, lover, musician. But in the end he was a victim.
I let my mind clear and I looked at the blood, the blood that had once been red and blue and alive and was now dead and brown.
The cops can only do so much. Even if they mean well, even if they’re geniuses, they have fifty or so cases and limited overtime and wives and husbands and children and mortgages. That’s why you hire a private eye. Because if she’s smart, the private eye has none of those things.
I knew the cops had looked under the sofa and looked through the desk and in the corners and through the laundry hamper. But there were secrets to find.
First I went to the kitchen and looked through the refrigerator. Nothing was out of order—soymilk, rotten vegetables, half a chocolate bar, everything you’d expect. I checked the freezer: ice, frozen vegan burgers, miscellaneous uninteresting foodstuffs. I went through the kitchen cabinets, the dish rack, the dishwasher, the spice shelf.
Nothing. This was the fourth time I’d done this, maybe more. There was nothing the first time and nothing the last time and nothing this time.
From my bag I pulled a penlight and I got down on the floor and looked under the furniture. Nothing. I looked through the sofa. I’d looked through it before, but sofas were complicated creatures. They were like slot machines. Things would go in and in and in, but most of them would disappear. Only occasionally would anything come back out, and only for those with dedication and luck and a good understanding of how the machine worked.
I’d searched the sofa before. Now I
really
searched the sofa. First I took off all the cushions and pillows and piled them a few feet away. I looked at the sofa carcass, its tight crevices and narrow valleys. I went to my car, opened the trunk, and after some rummaging found my slim jim, the tool locksmiths use to open a locked car door, a very thin, long piece of metal about an inch wide. I took the tool and went back to the sofa. First I reached my hand into the crevices around the edges. Next I went through the same crevices, as slowly as I could, with the slim jim. The first thing I found was a corn chip. I picked it up and put it aside. Next I found a few quarters and then a nickel. I was toward the back when the tool hit something hard and solid.
I felt a current run up from the small, solid thing through the tool and into my hand and I knew: It was a clue.
A clue is a word in another language, and mysteries speak the language of dreams. Mysteries speak the alchemical language of the birds. There is no dictionary. Not even for me.
I gently extracted the locksmithing tool and set it aside. The tool was hard, and I couldn’t risk damage. Instead I stretched my arm out as far as it would go, painfully pulling my shoulder a little from the socket. I moved my hand as best I could in the tight fit, and after a few seconds I found it: something small, hard, round. Slowly, carefully, I pulled it from the sofa and up to the light.
It was a poker chip.
Paul didn’t gamble. I took him with me to Reno once. For a case I had to pick up a suitcase full of cash from a doctor in
I went back to the living room. The body had been found here. Someone had tossed a carpet over the bloodstain on the wood floor. I pushed it aside.
I sat in a chair and looked at Paul’s blood.
No, I corrected myself. The victim’s blood. Paul was gone. There was no Paul and maybe never had been. Only the victim,
a
victim, the role he was apparently born to fill. All his life he probably thought he was something else, something so much more interesting: friend, husband, lover, musician. But in the end he was a victim.
I let my mind clear and I looked at the blood, the blood that had once been red and blue and alive and was now dead and brown.
The cops can only do so much. Even if they mean well, even if they’re geniuses, they have fifty or so cases and limited overtime and wives and husbands and children and mortgages. That’s why you hire a private eye. Because if she’s smart, the private eye has none of those things.
I knew the cops had looked under the sofa and looked through the desk and in the corners and through the laundry hamper. But there were secrets to find.
First I went to the kitchen and looked through the refrigerator. Nothing was out of order—soymilk, rotten vegetables, half a chocolate bar, everything you’d expect. I checked the freezer: ice, frozen vegan burgers, miscellaneous uninteresting foodstuffs. I went through the kitchen cabinets, the dish rack, the dishwasher, the spice shelf.
Nothing. This was the fourth time I’d done this, maybe more. There was nothing the first time and nothing the last time and nothing this time.
From my bag I pulled a penlight and I got down on the floor and looked under the furniture. Nothing. I looked through the sofa. I’d looked through it before, but sofas were complicated creatures. They were like slot machines. Things would go in and in and in, but most of them would disappear. Only occasionally would anything come back out, and only for those with dedication and luck and a good understanding of how the machine worked.
I’d searched the sofa before. Now I
really
searched the sofa. First I took off all the cushions and pillows and piled them a few feet away. I looked at the sofa carcass, its tight crevices and narrow valleys. I went to my car, opened the trunk, and after some rummaging found my slim jim, the tool locksmiths use to open a locked car door, a very thin, long piece of metal about an inch wide. I took the tool and went back to the sofa. First I reached my hand into the crevices around the edges. Next I went through the same crevices, as slowly as I could, with the slim jim. The first thing I found was a corn chip. I picked it up and put it aside. Next I found a few quarters and then a nickel. I was toward the back when the tool hit something hard and solid.
I felt a current run up from the small, solid thing through the tool and into my hand and I knew: It was a clue.
A clue is a word in another language, and mysteries speak the language of dreams. Mysteries speak the alchemical language of the birds. There is no dictionary. Not even for me.
I gently extracted the locksmithing tool and set it aside. The tool was hard, and I couldn’t risk damage. Instead I stretched my arm out as far as it would go, painfully pulling my shoulder a little from the socket. I moved my hand as best I could in the tight fit, and after a few seconds I found it: something small, hard, round. Slowly, carefully, I pulled it from the sofa and up to the light.
It was a poker chip.
Paul didn’t gamble. I took him with me to Reno once. For a case I had to pick up a suitcase full of cash from a doctor in
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